In today's aircraft, meals are typically reheated from already partially cooked meals prepared in ground-based catering units. Once transported to the aircraft, these meals are typically carried into the galley, positioned in the ovens, and reheated in standard meal carriers that have a number of shelves holding approximately thirty-two individual meals. An example of such a meal carrier 60 is shown in FIG. 3. As shown in that figure, each of these standard 32-meal carriers is installed in a single deep oven compartment and reheated within about 20-30 minutes prior to serving to the passengers. An airline will normally install enough ovens on the aircraft to heat up all the meals required to serve all passengers on an aircraft at the same time, so that the airline attendants only need to make one pass through the cabin.
However, these ovens often occupy substantial space in the aircraft galley, they are costly to purchase and operate, and they each require individual electronic control systems, which also take up space. Specifically, the ovens occupy space that could be used to store other items and provide greater levels of service to passengers. It has also been determined that saving galley space can free up space for additional passenger seats, increasing airline revenue.
Although some airlines have sought to custom build galleys with specifically-sized and designed ovens and other items, it is more often than not the case that industry standard sizes prevail. This is particularly true with aircraft galley ovens, due to the related catering processes that are all well-established to use traditionally sized carriers. For example, the meals to be served are generally prepared in casseroles at an off-site catering location, which uses ovens the 32-meal carriers as a key part of the logistics operations in the preparation of airline meals. The meal carriers are then transported to and from the aircraft via meal carts, which are also designed to receive and transport the standard 32-meal carriers. Finally, the 32-meal carriers are then loaded onto the aircraft and positioned in the ovens until the catering process is set to begin. Because all of these systems have been developed (and institutionalized) over the years, redesigning a completely new aircraft galley oven without consideration for current catering standards is not economically feasible, as adoption of such an oven would be unviable.
The present inventor has thus sought to improve aircraft galley ovens without requiring new meal-carrier sizes or revising current catering logistics. The improved ovens have also been designed to take advantage of certain unused space areas identified on-board aircraft in order to provide deeper ovens that can accommodate more meals.